Kirk Kiefer

Time for a nerdy comic post!

Over the past year I have discovered and fallen in love with the original Justice League International. I picked up the six available trades at Comic-Con last year and the only thing I could fault them for was that the last one ended on a cliff hanger and DC seemingly has no plans to collect the series any further.

Now, I’m not the first person to love this series- in fact, I’m WAY behind the curve.  Truth be told, my renewed love of comics over the past few years was triggered by the Nolan Batman films, which had me break out my old Batman-related comics and wonder why I ever stopped collecting them. I was a fan of the more serious, street-level stuff. I had zero interest in Batman with the Justice League - Bruce Wayne in space made no sense to me. Fast forward a few years when I had branched out some and decided to check out the original JLI stuff due to all the praise.

Folks, there’s a reason people love this stuff- it’s hilarious! The idea of bringing silliness to comics’ premiere superhero team seems, well, silly. But Keith Giffen and J.M. Dematteis make it work. 

And maybe the best thing that came out the whole JLI series? The wacky duo of Booster Gold and Blue Beetle.

These guys together are the great comedy team of comics. Some more great moments available HERE.

Okay, actually, maybe the best thing to come from  JLI was the running gag of the super serious Martian Manhunter loving oreos:

Now, over the past couple of weeks I’ve read/re-read my entire JLI collection, which now consists of:

- Justice League/Justice League International/Justice League America #1-60

- Justice League Europe #1 - 35

- Justice League Annual 1-5

- Justice League Europe Annual 1-2

- Justice League Quarterly 1-4

- JLA 80 Page Giant #1 (1998) (thanks to Will for the tip on this one!)

- Formerly Known as the Justice League TPB

- I Can’t Believe It’s Not the Justice League TPB

- DC Retroactive: Justice League America The 90s

- Justice League: Generation Lost

- Booster Gold: Past Imperfect (TPB)

Is there anything else as far as the Giffen/Dematteis run I am missing? Is the post-Giffen/Dematteis stuff worth getting? I’m not a huge fan of Dan Jurgens’s writing so figured the conclusion of “Breakdowns” was a good place to stop. 

In addition to the above, I also re-read Identity Crisis, which involves the murder of Sue Dibney, and The Omac Project trade, which centers on Max Lord first murdering Blue Beetle and then trying to use OMACs to wipe out metahumans. Reading these right after all the classic, zany JLI stuff is heartbreaking. Not sure why DC decided to turn everything so dark, but the idea of Maxwell Lord becoming this unbeatable super-villain who murders Ted Kord (Blue Beetle) is jarring, to say the least. And the scene of Booster and Beetle that I posted above, with Beetle jokingly claiming Max would “aim for the spinal cord” is equally upsetting when you consider that, when written, the idea that Max Lord would actually shoot anyone was literally laughable, then years later…

But enough of that. I will forever dream of the day when DC decides to put out an omnibus or two or three of the full JLI run I listed above (along with anything I’ve left out, of which I would like to be informed of folks!). Until then, my trades/single issues are more than adequate. Plus you get all the silly late 80s/early 90s ads…

Welp, the new album, which we’ve officially titled Sailing Stones, is all done. Recorded, mixed, mastered. Finito. We’re waiting for the artwork to come and then there’ll be nothing left to do but get CDs manufactured. I’ve considered doing vinyl, but due to the cost and the fact that I won’t be playing regularly enough to sell it, I’ve decided to just do CDs for the moment.

But boy, what a long road. It took nearly a year, all told, to get this thing finished. When we started rehearing songs I had my “wish list” of people I wanted on the record and we managed to get all but one or two folks on there, to which I’m forever in the debt of said musicians. 

With the benefit of hindsight, I can safely say this album doesn’t sound like I thought it would, in the best way possible. I figured it would basically sound like a Yardsale album, since it’s me singing, Colin and I as the rhythm section, my songwriting… but it really doesn’t. Even when I wrote more country or acoustic-y songs, we’d end up rocking them up in Yardsale. This time they stayed country-ish. There’s also some slightly sillier stuff than Yardsale typically allowed (“Bail Me Out Maryanne” notwithstanding), and more Beach Boys influence as well. And obviously the biggest reason it sounds different is that, other than me and Colin (and Jacob playing harmonica on a couple tunes and Neil on pedal steel), the musicians are not only different, but so is the instrumentation. The violin and the bigger horn section really makes a different. That and the extra vibra-slap, anyway.

I honestly wasn’t sure if I’d be able to make anything worth a damn. When we started I had a few songs written along with some older ones, and was trying hard to get back in the songwriting groove. Once Colin and I started rehearsing I went on a tear and wrote a bunch of tunes in short order that “saved” the album, in that, had I not written them, there wouldn’t have been enough decent tunes for a whole album. I also wasn’t sure if the whole idea of arranging as we go would work. Hell, when we started I hadn’t even met Ted, who ended up being a huge help not just in the recording, but working out vocals, arranging, deciding certain effects… a little bit of everything. And now he’s playing bass even. Having his extra input definitely made the album much stronger than it would’ve been.

And now we’re rehearsing for the release show. We have a date booked, which will be revealed once everything is firmed up for it. I’d like to start putting up some video from the rehearsals, if I can remember to film a tune here or there. And of course there’ll be more updates on how to get the album and various other things as we get closer to the release. Should be a busy couple of months here…

It’s been a busy month. In addition to my own stuff (more on that shortly), we’ve been ramping things up for the release of Ted’s new album, Waiting. This aforementioned “ramping” has included filming a new video wherein I got to drive this car:

Now, for those of you unawares, at some point in my life a huge bullseye was affixed to any car I drive, resulting in drunks, idiots on cell phones, senior citizens, and pizza delivery people from all walks of life hitting me on a semi-regular basis. I had a car totalled in February and my new car was rear-ended by a drunk lawyer a couple weeks ago. As a result, I was absolutely terrified to drive this car.

Additionally, I had everyone with even the slightest involvement with the video telling me “don’t wreck the car.” You know, as if I had planned to do so. Throw in the lack of power breaks and honestly, it took a bit for me to settle into being able to drive the thing. The first time out I got made fun of for driving like an old woman. I guess the moral of the story is that it’s hard being a rock star. 

I’ve also been doing some recording with Ted, working on new tunes of his and singing backup on recordings we’d started back in December. In return, Ted has officially become the bass player in the new band I’ve pulled together to perform my music, Ice Gondola.

Since the album is nearing completion (we’re on the latter part of the mixing process now!) it seemed prudent to start rehearsing for the eventual release show. With Ted on bass, Colin of course playing drums, and other ex-Yardsaler Chris Scott on guitar, we’ve been working up a set that includes all the songs destined for the album plus some Yardsale tunes and a cover or two. It’s weird playing Yardsale songs on guitar instead of the bass, and not having Jacob or Andrew there, but it’s been a blast to be playing my own songs in a band setting again. The plan for the eventual release show is to have an acoustic portion of the show, where we’ve rearranged a few old tunes, which has been neat. I’ve also enjoyed getting to sing Yardsale songs that I had a large hand in writing but didn’t get to sing lead on. I’m especially looking forward to adding the horns, steel, and other instrumentation we have planned…

And the last bit of news: I’ll be doing an acoustic set (with Ted backing me up) opening for the always amazing Scott Miller on May 12 at Uncle Slayton’s. Super nervous, but equally excited to be opening for Scott again. 

Elvis Costello discusses Levon Helm

Wonderful and worth a minute of your time.

Still obsessively listening to Television. Here’s “Friction” from Live at the Old Waldorf. Listen to that solo! And I don’t know if Television’s rhythm section gets enough credit, hiding behind the guitar gods of Verlaine and Lloyd, but boy, do they smoke. 

• Question: What does the name KIRK mean? In Norvegian and Danish it's like "Curch" but with an E - 'KIRKE' - i-m-just-asking
• Answer:

  I was always told it translated to “church” but, truth be told, I’ve never bothered to look it up. 

It’s Easter, and what better way to celebrate than with a little Television? (What do you mean that seems like a non-sequiter?)

So all I’ve listened to in the past two weeks has been Television. Marquee Moon is one of my all-time favorite albums, but they have so much amazing material beyond their debut album. A pre-Marquee Moon set is long overdue, but thanks to bootlegs the material is still available. For example, there’s this tune, recorded three some-odd years before Marquee Moon. 

Ever wondered where I got my Twitter handle (and possible band name)? Here you go.

That was the scene from the control room last night- two saxes, trumpet, and trombone laying down some tasty parts on three tunes. Trombonist Elmer White and I had mapped out parts on two of the songs a couple months back, which he was nice enough to notate, so that gave us a good starting point when it came time to record.

Now, even though I’d worked with horns a bit in Yardsale, this was entirely different. Maybe it was having four players instead of two, maybe it was the musicians themselves, but I definitely felt like this was more involved and collaborative. It was quite a lot of fun standing in there playing along and semi-directing everyone to get the parts nailed down. Luckily these guys were all pros and my inarticulate mumbling and humming over the piano was easily translated into listenable, purty horn parts. It was nice to have folks throwing out ideas and trying different stuff as well, especially on the third tune, “Lust From Afar”, during which we had everyone just kind of solo through the song so we could pick and choose the best parts. 

And those horn overdubs were the last thing we needed recording-wise, so that phase is, at last, complete. It’s taken nearly a year from the first session (and Colin and I had begun rehearing a few months prior to that!), and I’m glad that this part is behind us. Not that it hasn’t been enjoyable, but the scheduling involved can get tiresome and, to be blunt, I’m ready to hear this thing finished already. Obviously there’s still the mixing and the mastering, but it’ll be nice to be able to take some time away from the songs, no longer having to listen and decide if they need something else and, if so, who I can find to play it. And of course once the album is finished it’ll be time to put on a release show…

Last one- though the studio version is excellent, I always got a kick out of this live version of “Listen to the Band” from the Monkees’ 33 1/3 Revolutions Per Monkee special.